Turkey's Halkbank share sale fully subscribed -sources

LONDON/ISTANBUL, Nov 16 (Reuters) - The Turkish government has received orders for all the shares it is offering in lender Halkbank, two sources close to the deal said on Friday.

The government is hoping the sale of 20.8 percent of the lender will help lift what have been disappointing privatisation receipts in recent years, with tough funding conditions causing the postponement of several previous tenders.

“(Order) books are covered,” said one of the sources, adding that demand had been better than expected.

Earlier this week Halkbank set a price range of 13.80-15.90 lira per share for the sale of 299 million shares, meaning it should raise 4.1-4.8 billion lira ($2.3-$2.7 billion).

That would make it the third biggest share sale in Europe so far this year after Italian lender UniCredit’s $9.6 billion rights issue in January and Russia’s sale of a $5 billion stake in Sberbank in September, according to Thomson Reuters data.

Order books on the secondary public offering, which opened on Wednesday, are due to close later on Friday. The government expected to announce the final price on Monday.